Integr8: Recurrents More Important To Country Than Top 40

A Look At Recurrents

According to an INTEGR8 RESEARCH blog titled “Why Recurrents Are More Important to Country Than Top 40,” songs that listeners still love after 45 weeks should be power recurrents for Country radio. INTEGR8 President and blog author MATT BAILEY asserts, “Playing listener's tried and true favorites as if they were still currents might not hurt you today, but it could make your station seem stale tomorrow.”

In the second of a three-part series looking at differences between Country and Top 40 programming practices (NET NEWS 9/14), INTEGR8 compared performance of hits in streaming versus radio airplay. For the first 44 weeks of a song’s life, what radio listeners hear closely mirrors what they play for themselves on streaming services. After that, the story is different. “While 18% of the Country songs listeners stream most are 45-plus weeks old, a scant 2% of the Top 10 songs in Country radio airplay are 45-plus weeks old. That’s because radio has almost always moved songs that are over 44 weeks old to recurrent categories or has stopped playing them entirely.”

And they’re correct in doing so, says BAILEY, because playing songs listeners hate or are simply tired of can make them tune out, whereas, for consumers who use streaming services such as SPOTIFY, “it doesn’t matter how many people are tired of song, or even how many people hate a song: How often people who love it play it is the only thing that matters. Additionally, listeners want their Country station to keep them up to date with the latest Country hits. “Your reputation for playing the latest Country hits can head south if listeners are always hearing last year’s songs when they tune in.”  Read the entire blog here.

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